The Wall Street Journal’s view of Monday’s Supreme Court ruling that affirms religious liberty makes this wonderful point.
Nancy Pelosi called the ruling “an outrageous step against the rights of America’s women.” For Senator Patty Murray, it is “a dangerous precedent and takes us closer to a time in history when women had no choice and no voice.”
Er, that would be the medieval period prior to . . . 2012. For the benefit of the impressionable, let us explain what returning to this status quo ante means: Declining to force someone to pay for something is not the same as “banning” it. Women who work for the small number of religiously oriented businesses will still be able to buy birth control for as little as $9 a month.
This political overkill suggests that Democrats are secretly delighted by the ruling, which they hope to use to scare women to the polls and salvage their shaky midterm prospects. Yet the real liberal grievance isn’t with the Supreme Court but with RFRA itself. If Democrats are as upset as they claim, they ought to campaign this fall to repeal RFRA and be honest about how little they care about religious liberty.
So I ask: Do women really believe this ruling denies them birth control? That is ludicrous, and those women who endorse that nonsensical thinking are either incredibly gullible, willfully ignorant, or Democrat Party operatives. What’s more, it is 2014. I thought independent women oppose relying on anyone for help, yet they expect someone else to pay for their birth control device? Grow up.
